Pit Stop Before Tomorrow
by Blade of Justice
Summary: It's New Year's Eve and the Go-Busters are celebrating. How could they not? The upcoming year is to be their first completely free of the enemies they'd been facing for so long... but Nick can't help but keep looking back on one particular event from the year before.


Cheeda Nick had seen many Christmases and New Year's Days come to pass since he had been built. While it was just over a decade ago, it seemed like so much less looking back. Not a great many of them were particularly happy ones, but... he liked to think some of them were okay. He thought one in particular would always stand out to him... The one that had started everything. The one during which Hiromu and the others had lost everything. It was true that that Christmas still stood out to him. Since then, he had stood by Hiromu through them all, of course, and watched him grow up, slowly but surely, into the young man Nick was proud to call his buddy today.

There had been another Christmas that was a rather unforgettable one. The Christmas that led directly to the defeat of the Messiah's forces once and for all. This past year since then... had been nothing short of extraordinary. Their battle hadn't been finished yet, and their stories were far from over — as they soon learned once they began battling alongside their fellow heroes, like the Kyoryugers, more and more — but one thing was for certain.

They had done it. They had finally... _finally_... done it.

And so today was a rather special day. Tomorrow would be a fresh start for everyone. The last of the Messiah's forces... well, Enter's forces eventually, had been taken care of this past year. Tomorrow would truly be their new beginning — the beginning of their lives without the worry of the Vagras on their shoulders.

It should have been a happy occasion. No, for all intents and purpose, it _was_ a happy occasion. For Hiromu and the other Go-Busters, at least, it seemed to be. For the most part, Nick was enjoying himself well enough too...

Yet there was still that lingering feeling. Fleeting memories of a time spent living another life, a world without the Messiah. A world without Enter. A world without any of it. Flashes of dying not once, but twice, and watching everything he loved and everything he fought for crumble before his eyes. A year ago today, Nick had experienced something unlike anything he had ever known, even amidst all the chaos and destruction that that accident that Christmas long ago had spread.

It had been a ridiculous sort of world. It had been a world that even now, Nick still didn't completely understand. It had been a freak chance, a luck of the draw that could have never happened in any reality if not for the interference of the supernatural — the holy, even.

But... it _had_ happened. It had. It had also been happy. For a time? It had also been home. And now, with the one year anniversary of that strange battle upon him, that strange trip into that other possibility, that other lifetime, Nick couldn't help but think back.

Hiromu and the others, even Gorisaki and Usada, hadn't been there. They hadn't lived another life for an entire _year_... They had been moved by the sacrifice the other Go-Busters had made, certainly, but it couldn't have meant to them what it did to Nick. They had met those Go-Busters one moment and then those Go-Busters had ceased to exist all within the next few. Come and gone again just like that.

It wasn't that they didn't understand. It was more that they couldn't. How could they? Nick knew full fell that he couldn't possibly expect them — except _anyone_ — to understand what had happened if they hadn't lived through it.

A mechanical sigh escaped him.

He should have been happy, he should have been excited for the future ahead of him, but there were still those lingering thoughts... If only he could just _talk_ to someone about it, then maybe... Maybe he could...

Another sigh.

Well... There _was_... _one_ person who might understand him, but Nick just found the idea laughable. It was perhaps why he hadn't ever pursued it before.

After all, someone else _had_ been there. It was just...

"Ah. Bike guy. **I** have been looking for you."

Nick nearly jumped a foot into the air at the sound of the voice behind him. Spinning around, he sighed a third time as he caught sight of who it was that had decided New Year's Eve would be the perfect time to assassinate him by means of shock.

"Gah! Speak of the devil..." The Buddyroid shook his head. It was typical, really. Of course he would show up right when Nick had just started to think about him. He really shouldn't have expected any less of the beetle. "J, you scared me...! Don't do that. Anyway, what do you want?"

There was just the matter of who that person _was_.

Rather than answer Nick's question, the silver and gold Buddyroid chose to remain, instead taking his place standing next to Nick.

"**I** don't see what's so interesting about this." For a moment, Nick didn't understand what J was referring to. He glanced to his side to see what the beetle could possibly be looking at, and he realized that J was looking where Nick had been staring for the past... however long until only a moment ago. "Your hobbies are strange. Incomprehensible to **me**."

Nick let out a mechanical laugh, one that was almost rueful sounding. He couldn't really call this a _hobby_... But he _had_ been standing here for a lot longer than he should have, huh? He hoped it hadn't gotten to become hours yet, but he wasn't looking at a clock either. He was starting to feel like he should be scared to.

Oh yeah... This _was_ pretty bad. Getting "comforted" by J of all people? He wasn't sure what to think about that, even if he _had_ been thinking about seeking the other Buddyroid out himself. Sort of. ... Okay... Not... _really_...

"**I** don't see what's so funny, either." The blunt response, and perhaps the expected one, followed shortly after Nick's laugh. Nick would have rolled his eyes if he could. The Buddyroid at his side turned his head slightly, looking at Nick now. The red Buddyroid never could tell what was going on in this guy's head, seriously... "You shouldn't be wasting your time here, bike. What's the point? Your actions are incomprehensible to **me**."

He expected this. It was why he hadn't sought out J in the first place. Of course J wouldn't understand. He had known J would have some kind of stupid, self-centered reaction from the start... But it was still so frustrating! With how he'd been feeling so listless for the day so far, with the one person who should have been able to relate acting like this... Was it so strange he felt like snapping?

"Look, J, I know this may be hard for **you** to understand, but in case you forgot, around this time last year-"

"They gave up their lives willingly. They understood exactly what they were doing." J's voice was calm. Distant... though it was always like that, in a way. It was like he had expected this response from Nick, which just bothered him all the more.

"Come on, J, how could you _possibly..._"

"Jin also understood."

... Oh.

Right.

Nick was silent after that. J didn't add anything else. Either he felt whatever point he had wanted to make had been made, or he had no intentions of saying anything more if Nick didn't give him a reason to. After _that_... Nick didn't particularly feel like giving him one, in all honesty. He was feeling pretty low, all things considered.

He had been way off base with this one, hadn't he?

J probably understood much better than he himself did.

After all... J hadn't just lost the other Go-Busters that he had not only gotten to know for that year, but also fought alongside... But not long after getting back, he'd also lost someone much more than that.

Nick was the one who didn't understand.

"J, I, uh..." Breaking the awkward silence, Nick looked at the other Buddyroid. He couldn't leave things like this. J may have been weird, but now more than ever, Nick was sure he wasn't a bad guy. They'd had their disagreements before, and they sure as heck would have more in the future, but right now, he just had to... say _something_...! "Listen, I didn't-"

"**I** know. Roads aren't the only thing you get miserably lost on." Flabbergasted, Nick was left speechless. Here he was trying to _apologize_, and J insulted him? ... Not that he probably didn't deserve it from J — this time, anyway — but... still! This guy was just... so...! "Here. **I** have somewhere to be."

With that, J shoved something into Nick's hands and promptly turned to leave.

"J... What is...?" Nick didn't understand. This was... But... _Why_?

"Your Christmas present. **I** had better things to do on Christmas, so it's late. You should be thankful to get anything from **me** in the first place. Now stop being lost. It's annoying to watch."

Dumbfounded, Nick watched his fellow Buddyroid go without so much as a word more from either. He didn't need to say anything. After that, neither of them really did, did they? In Nick's hands was the can of Enetron J had been holding throughout their entire conversation. Nick had paid it no mind since he'd assumed it was for J, but here it was... apparently for him. Unopened, without a "Gah! It's empty?!" punchline in sight. It was just... He still didn't...

The idea of J giving _anyone_ a present for _anything_ was ludicrous. Nick knew that. Even though he was giving J credit for a lot of things right now, he still knew J well enough to know _that_. J was still always going to be J, even if Nick _did_ get lost on "conversations" sometimes, or... whatever else that beetle had been implying. So... Why had he done this? J knew darn well Christmas had been last week. If he had really cared, he wouldn't have waited. J would have made his delivery as perfect as he — or as **he** — was.

It couldn't be that... J had _purposefully_ waited until today to give this to Nick because of what had happened last year... _knowing_ Nick would probably be feeling down about it all...

... could it?

He shook his head, finding somewhat warmer laughter coming out of him as he took in his present. He'd probably never know. J was truly an enigma sometimes. He did know one thing, at least.

"I guess I just needed a quick refill before the New Year."

He wasn't looking anywhere but forward anymore.


End file.
